How to automate a daily backup of our MySQL database - table structure and data

We need to set up a daily backup of one of MySQL databases that we manage. This is currently hosted and we access it using Heidi SQL.
There is no scheduler in Heidi.

Looking into this further, the general advice seems to be to use mysqldump for scheduled backups and that we'd do that with an automatic Windows task and mysqldump.exe from the MySQL server using the following syntax:

mysqldump.exe -hYourIpOrHost -uYourUserName -pYourPassword yourdatabase >c:\path\to\backupfile.sql

Is this the best way to do this? We basically need to ensure that if a worst-case scenario occurs, that we can immediately restore the database, and data, from the previous day's backup.

I'm also not familiar with creating automatic Windows tasks.

Any advice/guidance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
NJ

You can usually schedule backups through cpanel. Ask your hosting provider what backup options they have. They may already be backing it up for you.

We're not running cPanel. We have phpMyAdmin for the database, via the hosting account, but that's it.

Your hosting provider should have backup options. It wouldn't be done through your website directly.

Here is an article that might help you see some of the options: https://www.jotform.com/blog/how-to-backup-mysql-database/

Hi Ray,

A lot of these solutions seem to lean towards backing up a local MySQL database. The database we need to backup is hosted.
In your experience, what is the best way to run a daily backup of a hosted MySQL database?

Thank you.
NJ

I use the daily backup manager in my Plesk or CPanel control panel.

...and if we don't have access to cPanel or Plesk, basically if we're on a shared hosting platform?
This is worrying because we'll have to manually run a backup from Heidi or phpMyAdmin, which is going to be very labour intensive.

Our host only offers cPanel or Plesk on their dedicated server packages.
Any advice would be greatly appreicated.
Thank you.
NJ

Have you contacted your hosting provider about this? I'm sure they offer backups in some form. This is more of a hosting issue than a web development issue, so it isn't my expertise. It also has more to do with the hosting provider and what they offer than your php code.